Rural affairs reporter for The Age

Department of Environment technical officer George Alcock among the giant brassica plants.

It was likened to a tropical jungle, or a scene from the movie Jurassic Park - minus the dinosaurs. Inside the controlled environment of a large plastic igloo in country Victoria, researchers raised vegetables so well that some grew more than five metres tall.

While some disappointed Melbourne home gardeners are still waiting for their tomatoes to turn red, researchers from the Department of Environment and Primary Industries are now reflecting on the seed yield from their ''Jubrassic Park'' vegetable plot, so-named after the brassica plants they grew and the Steven Spielberg movie.

Despite standing in garden-variety plastic pots with a 20 centimetre diameter, the super-sized vegetable plants grew and grew and grew - for nearly two years. Dozens measured three to four metres tall, more than 20 exceeded four metres, and two giants grew beyond five metres. The last of the giants was cut down last week.

The plants are part of a project in the fight against the fungal disease blackleg, a disease that costs Australia's canola industry an estimated $77 million a year, according to the Grains Research and Development Corporation.

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The plants were once seeds just a millimetre in diameter. They were imported from France, where the varieties have been grown for many generations by particular families or villages.

All of the plants grown are members of a vegetable species that was crucial in the development of canola. Researchers hope that by studying these varieties they can find some that exhibit resistance to blackleg, which can then be interbred with canola.

The growth of the plants was something ''quite out of this world'', said Bob Redden, a curator at the Australian Grains Genebank. ''When you walked down the aisle, you felt that you were walking through a forest. You were shaded out and these things were leaning in various directions because they were top-heavy. We propped them up with stakes and they were leaning across. It was like something out of a crazy dream.''

The crop grew so tall ''because the flowering phase of the crop growth had not been triggered under our growing conditions. So consequently, all the energy it was getting from the sun was funnelled into more growth. And it just kept on growing taller and bigger and bigger,'' Mr Redden said.

The research is funded jointly by the department and the research corporation. Agriculture Minister Peter Walsh said the harvested seeds would be stored at the Australian Grains Genebank. ''The theory is that by going back to canola's distant relatives, scientists might find some natural resistance against blackleg,'' he said.

In some cases cutting down the giant vegetables was a battle. Department technical officer George Alcock said some were so thick he had to cut down a few dozen with a handsaw.